


Primary Source

by shadow_lover



Category: Original Work
Genre: Awkward introductions, Extra Treat, Gen, ToT: Chocolate Box, ToT: Monster Mash, Unscrupulous Interdisciplinary Studies, new roommate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-31
Updated: 2016-10-31
Packaged: 2018-08-27 06:16:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8390395
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadow_lover/pseuds/shadow_lover
Summary: Daniel was looking forward to his interdisciplinary research seminar. He was also looking forward to getting a new roommate.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [syrupwit](https://archiveofourown.org/users/syrupwit/gifts).



> Happy Halloween! :)

> Daniel, 
> 
> Please disregard this email until you’ve gotten back for the semester. I just wanted to give you a heads-up that there’s been a change to your interdisciplinary seminar curriculum, so you can skip the Plymouth readings I attached last week. 
> 
> We recently acquired a very exciting 17th century artifact that will be the focus of your research this semester. The Dean won’t let me say more over email, but suffice to say it’s a one-of-a-kind primary source :-) Drop by my office hours when you’re back in town and I’ll catch you up to speed. 
> 
> Hope you’re enjoying your winter break! 
> 
> Aimee Chen, Ph.D.  
>  Department of History  
>  October Smith University 
> 
> _It is not only fine feathers that make fine birds. ~ Aesop_

After a holiday spent sleeping, bickering with his sister, and beating Inquisition twice, Daniel returned to school feeling pretty damn optimistic about spring semester. He was looking forward to the research seminar. Professor Chen was hard to keep up with, but he was pretty sure he could stay on her good side and land a glowing reference for grad school apps. She sent him some readings over the break, and one follow-up email was waiting in his inbox; he stopped reading after the first sentence: _Please disregard this email until you’ve gotten back for the semester._

Daniel was also looking forward to getting a new roommate. He’d spent his first semester of junior year tiptoeing around the utter lunatic. Axel never did laundry, stole Daniel’s pencils, and stumbled drunkenly back in with a different drunk girl every day. Which Daniel would honestly be fine with at, like, midnight, but it was a bit weird at nine a.m.

Luckily, right before finals week, Axel announced he was dropping out of college to tour with his rock band. Daniel didn’t bother to point out Axel didn’t _have_ a rock band; he just Facebook messaged him links to local guitar classes and helped him pack up.

So in January, things were looking up. Even though his flight was delayed three hours—hey, it gave him time to finish annotating the Plymouth Colony documents Professor Chen had sent. And even though he waited for half an hour watching other people’s suitcases bob along the conveyor belt before the guy announced that Flight 300’s baggage was actually at baggage claim _B_ , not _A_. And then he missed the next bus out because some asshole with an umbrella was taking up the _entire_ sidewalk as Daniel ran to the stop—

Said umbrella being the first clue that the rumpled night sky was about to dump fucking _buckets_ on him for fifteen minutes and seventeen seconds until the next bus swung around.

On the bus, he checked his email on his phone. Only now did he get to the second sentence: _so you can skip the Plymouth readings I attached last week._

Goddamnit.

Okay, so things were not, in fact, looking so up. Daniel’s mood was dark and thunderous when he finally got back to the dorm at one in the morning.

His sneakers squelched across the tile floor of the lobby. They squelched on the laminate elevator floor. They squelched along the hallway carpet as he trudged along to Room 202. One hand clutched and cramped around the handle of his suitcase; the other awkwardly fumbled the key into the door. 

But the door was already unlocked. Daniel remembered his new roommate just as he heard a tremendous hammering from inside.

“What the fuck,” he said, and the hammering immediately ceased.

“Greetings?” called a voice from inside the room.

Daniel shoved the door open to find his new roommate astride his desk. A large sheet of plywood was affixed over the window; said roommate held a nail in one hand and a hammer in the other. His long black hair was held in a ponytail with a purple scrunchie.

Daniel stared. The dude looked out of place, otherworldly. He was dressed normally enough: sneakers, blue jeans, a university t-shirt. But he was so pale he looked like notebook paper, all white with veins like thin blue lines, and his wide eyes were blood-red.

“You must be Daniel,” the roommate said, and jumped off of the desk.

Well, he had to have jumped, but it was more like he was on the desk and then a second later standing right in front of Daniel, stretching out a hand in greeting. Daniel took his hand on reflex. As cold as he was from his journey through the rain, this dude was colder.

“Nice to meet you,” Daniel said, another reflex. “What’s your name?”

“Frothingham. Bread-of-Life Frothingham. Pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

His expression didn't falter; his oddly accented voice was steady. He said it just like that, as if it was actually his name, and as the moment stretched out between them, Daniel realized there was no punchline.

“Bread-of-Life,” Daniel said faintly.

Bread-of-Life Frothingham beamed. “You can call me Brad!”

Daniel glanced again over Brad’s shoulder. There was more changed besides the plywood over the window; the bed on the other side of the room had been propped up on risers, and a huge, giant box loomed under it. There was a new mini fridge parked next to Daniel’s. “I’m glad to see you’ve settled in…” he started, and then wasn’t sure how to continue. Because Brad was still beaming, and in the sickly fluorescent light, his teeth looked _sharp_.

“Beg pardon,” Brad said. “Is something amiss?”

 _Yes,_ Daniel was about to answer. _Something is quite amiss, because your mouth looks like a knife drawer and there’s a coffin under your bed._ But when he opened his mouth, his phone rang.

“Aha!” Brad leaned in closer, peering around at Daniel’s back pocket. “Mistress Aimee explained about it. It’s called a ‘telephone,’ and now you have to press a button. Or a screen, she wasn’t very clear.”

Daniel didn’t recognize the number. Usually he would send it to voicemail, but right now he’d like a minute or two to think about anything except red-eyed Brad. “I’ll be back in a sec,” he said, and fled from the room. 

Out in the hall, he swiped the screen. “Hello?”

“Daniel! It’s Professor Chen. So sorry to call so late, but Entwistle didn’t copy me on his memo, and I only _just_ learned the delivery arrived early.”

“What delivery?” He stared down at the carpet and the slowly widening puddle around his shoes. “Look, I’m sorry, can we go over this in office hours tomorrow? I just got back and I have... things to sort out with my new roommate.” 

“Oh good, so he’s settling in? You don’t need to start taking notes tonight, we’ll go over procedure tomorrow. The Dean wants you to sign a nondisclosure agreement, ugh. You know, our archeology team found him boxed up in a private archive over in Massachusetts last week. They’re not sure how long he was in storage. It’s going to be a great opportunity for you to put your psychology minor to work—as soon as I heard we were getting him, I knew you’d be perfect for the project.”

A hammer pounded down the hall, a rapid, echoing heartbeat.

"Perfect?" Daniel hissed. “ _His name is Bread-of-Life Frothingham_.”

“He’s going by Brad this century,” Professor Chen said, before a cacophony of squeaks and chirps sounded over the line. “Oh, fuck! The parakeets!” And she hung up. 

Daniel turned slowly to gaze upon his dorm door. It had his name written on a paper cut-out of a game controller, right next to the paper guitar cut-out that said _Axel_.

He stroked the paper guitar wistfully. Then, with a deep, steadying breath. he ventured back inside to confront the monster

"First things first," he said. "No booty calls at nine in the morning."

Brad was crouched at the new mini-fridge. He straightened up holding a bottle of dark red liquid. "I don't know what a booty call is," he said. "But all I do in the morning is sleep."

"Well, okay then," Daniel said. He kicked his suitcase towards the dresser so he could unpack. Maybe, just maybe, he could work with this.


End file.
